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Applied Humanism
Comparative Media Studies focuses on social
and cultural interactions with technology. It is
not the study of interactive technologies, per se.
The humanities offer a tradition of thinking about media
content, genre, storytelling, and pedagogy, while the qualitative
social sciences have an equally rich vocabulary for discussing
media context, culture, society, and community. CMS promotes
a pragmatic style of humanistic and social scientific scholarship
that prepares students to think critically and productively
about media form, content, and context.
CMS helps students to become leaders who
shape and enhance our understanding of media, drawing on
their background in the humanities and the social sciences
to tackle compelling real-world problems. The CMS curriculum
helps students build upon their prior technical and professional
knowledge to develop new conceptualmodels and new forms
of expertise and to expand their brainstorming, problem-solving,
negotiation, and communication skills.
New Expertise
Business leaders, consultants and media
designers need up-to-date intellectual tools to think critically
about media and their potential for circulating information
and dispersing intellectual capital. Government leaders
must reach informed decisions about policy and regulation
that will affect changing media environments. Journalists
must better understand how they can transmit information
across a variety of media. Academics need to broaden their
understanding of our changing cultural and social environment,
recognizing the impact that media systems will have on the
way we live, learn, and interact. Through conferences and
forums, CMS students interact with corporate leaders, practicing
journalists, contemporary artists, policy makers, and leading
intellectuals -- a salon culture within an academic space.
A primary, recurring question posed in such conversations
is how to translate the abstractions of media theory into
concrete practices.
Making and Thinking
CMS major thrusts are on developing critical
thinking and on the historical understanding of media, not
necessarily on honing students' technical skills. With that,
we strongly believe that hands-on learning and production
experience is essential to a full understanding of modern
media. We encourage students to apply their theoretical
knowledge by helping to build usable products, then to evaluate
and challenge these tangible projects through critical inquiry.
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